


consequences

by KingLilith



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Civil War Team Iron Man, Hurt Tony Stark, Not Captain America Friendly, slight gore, smashing a shield in someones chest has concequences
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-03
Updated: 2018-02-03
Packaged: 2019-03-13 01:58:10
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,416
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13560261
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KingLilith/pseuds/KingLilith
Summary: “Did you really smash your shield through his chest and then left him without any form of communication?”Suddenly Steve feels cold.“I didn’t… no, well, yes. I mean – “





	consequences

When they get to Wakanda spirits are high.

The avengers -or what is left of them- have a quick audience with king T’Challa and are then regulated to a building at the edge of the city. There are guards posted outside that are said to be for their protection, but probably also there to keep them in check. None of them really mind, they understand the King has a duty to his people and doesn’t fully trust them yet. So spirits are high, and while there are still plans being made there is also a lot of time to relax and de-stress.

Until a week in their stay, when the King almost literally storms in.

“What did you do?!”

T’Challa is looking right at Steve, who has no idea what he is talking about. It is more the look on the king’s face than the hasty entrance or anything else that makes Steve sit up in attention. The king’s face is usually very closed off, but now there are so many emotions warring on there it’s a proverbial circus.

“What did you do?” The king questions again, stepping closer with a look in his eye Steve can’t really place. “What did you do to Tony Stark?”

Steve is confused, they have been in Wakanda for the whole week, T’Challa knows this. Some of the tension leaves his shoulders and he idly wonders what Tony is accusing him off this time.

“What did you do to him?” T’Challa questions again. A note of what is almost hysterics in his voice that frightens Steve a bit and makes him tense again. “Did you really smash your shield through his chest and then left him without any form of communication?”

Suddenly Steve feels cold.

“I didn’t… no, well, yes. I mean – “

T’Challa just looks at him, visibly trying to calm himself down. Looking at Steve like he sees him for the first time. He doesn’t say anything else, just stares at Steve waiting for him to speak. But Steve has suddenly lost the ability to form a proper sentence.

“Is- is Tony alright?” Steve asks instead after a few seconds of silence, not knowing what else to say.

The king gives him a look that Steve is not certain how to interpret. “You left him.” T’Challa says slowly, in a deliberate careful way that makes Steve ache. “You left him in Siberia. With a shield smashed through his chest, a disabled suit and no way to communicate.”

The words are slow to sink in and Steve suddenly feels very heavy, like the building crashed down on him while he was talking to the king. He doesn’t even notice the other avengers move behind him.

Natasha is the one who speaks the words that Steve cannot force out of his mouth.

“Is he alive?” Her tone is flat, and to a stranger she might sound cold, but Steve knows her and can hear the way her breath catches just ever so slightly.

T’Challa doesn’t even look at her, but just keeps staring at Steve like he has never seen him before. In the same carefully enunciated and forcibly calm way as before he says; “They found him yesterday.”

Then he is quiet, and just looks at Steve’s face a few moments longer before he slowly turns around and starts to leave. And Steve panics, because that isn’t an answer. They found him how? Fine and joking? Or- or… He can’t finish his own thought.

He steps forward in a way that must look as frantic as he feels, because the guards that accompanied the king inside suddenly step forward in a protective manner. “Found him how!?” Steve manages to get out of his mouth. “Is he- is he…”

T’Challa turns back, but is no longer paying any real attention to them. “He is… not entirely dead.”

And that should be good news, Steve thinks, but the way he says it and the look on his face make Steve think otherwise. The King says something in Wakandan to the guards and then is out of the door before Steve can even think about demanding more information.

He can hear the others behind him. Discussing, demanding answers. Voices everywhere between dismissive and frantic.

 

Steve is not really paying attention. He is trying very hard not to pay attention to or listen to anything that is not his own breathing. (Slowly in, and slowly out. And again.) So he almost misses it when a guard walks back in.

Natasha is near the guard in a flash, asking questions and demanding answers. The guard doesn’t say anything, barely even looks at them, but just shoves something into Natasha’s hands and walks back out.

Natasha goes still. And Steve concentrates very hard on breathing (Slowly in, and slowly out. And again.), trying not to look at her.

The others join her in looking at whatever it is the guard gave her, and they grow quiet as well.

Eventually Steve can no longer bear it and gets up off the floor (when did he sit down?) and walks slowly towards where everyone is clustered.

It is a newspaper.

If he was in a better state of mind he might have found it ironic how a technologically advanced country like Wakanda still has paper newspapers, but not now. The paper itself is written in Wakandan, so the articles are not much use, but there on the front page are two big pictures, in full colour. And they say more than any article could.

The first is sharp, glossy and clearly taken with a good camera. It shows Siberia. There must have been camera’s there and someone or maybe even Zemo himself must have released the tapes, because the still is definitely of him and Tony in the Siberian bunker.

But mostly it’s him, hanging above Tony, shield raised and poised to smash down. The worst thing about it is how this horrible sharp picture clearly shows their faces. He didn’t know he could look so angry, that that was even an expression his face could make. And Tony. Tony just looks… (surprised, frightened, disbelieving, terrified. All of that and more)

The second picture is even worse.

It is grainy, low quality and out of focus. It shows… someone. He can’t say it’s Tony, because there is too much blood and bandages and machines to properly see the human underneath. There are lots of green blobs that Steve supposes are the out of focus surgeons. And then there are two others, clearly magicians (one of them Steve vaguely recognises, Tony might have called him a beard-bro once?), he tries to focus on them, how the magic flows from their hands to the… person slightly off-centre in the photograph.

But is impossible not to look. Even with this horrible quality it is visible that Tony has no chest. Steve doesn’t know how open-hear surgery looks like, but he knows it’s not this. It is one giant open chasm and Steve can’t even see any ribs. (doesn’t know if Tony has any left)

He doesn’t know who he’s leaning on, but Steve isn’t sure he can hold up his own weight for much longer.

He tries very hard to focus on anything that is not the giant bloody chasm that is supposed to be Tony’s chest. Focusing on Tony’s knees seems like a safe choice, but one of Tony’s leg seems to cut off just below the knee, and god, that isn’t just the photo, he really has lost his leg. The quality and angle of the photo are to bad to see any other limbs in full, and there are so many bandages and so much blood and people Steve isn’t sure of anything other than the giant gaping hole. (He tries very hard not to think about all the frost-bite stories he knows, and how Tony needs to work with his hands like he needs air.)

Steve vaguely remembers he needs air as well, not sure when he stopped breathing. (Slowly in, and slowly out. And again.)

Suddenly he is sitting down. Someone is speaking to him but he doesn’t know who.

The paper is no longer in front of him, but all he can see is Tony, with frantic blobs of green and magic around him and a giant hole in his chest that Steve put there.

He puts his head in his hand and cries. (He isn’t sure he’ll ever be able to stop crying again.)


End file.
